Those words echo in Hassell's head as he repeats his story to Deanne Tate, director of Veterans First.

In another month, he tells her, he'll begin college. His GI Bill will kick in. All he needs is two months' rent.

Tate listens politely. Then she cries.

the fighting's toll

America has been at war for 10 years – a longer period than any time in its history. Both the war in Afghanistan, launched Oct. 7, 2001, and the war in Iraq, launched March 20, 2003, have outlasted the eight years of combat in Vietnam. We've buried more than 6,000 troops and treated more than 45,000 with wounds.

Still, the full price paid by Hassell and 2.2 million veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan remains to be seen. Those ripples continue to widen.

More than 300,000 have suffered traumatic brain injuries, the hallmark of these wars, according to the Pentagon. One in five – including Hassell – suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, which summons everything from sleeplessness to rage to suicide.

Factor in 27 percent unemployment for men under 24 returning from these wars, and it paints a bleak landscape for the warriors who served their country, asking only that the country return the favor.

America seems to have forgotten them. As one wounded warrior put it: “To the media, it's old news. All we hear about are Casey Anthony, Charlie Sheen and Lindsay Lohan.”

The Battle of Najaf

Charlie Company rolled into Najaf the morning of Aug. 5, 2004.

“We all thought we were going to die,” Hassell recalls of the nine-hour firefight that launched the Battle of Najaf. “Everyone else was running out of the city, and we're running toward the bullets.”

After five days of heavy fighting, his squad chased several Mahdi Army fighters from Iraqi Islamic cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's home into an abandoned two-story school. A grenade bounced down the stairs and exploded, tearing open the abdomen of Lance Corp. Ryan Borgstrom.

He'd bleed to death if someone didn't carry him out, past the gunfire blasting from the upstairs windows. Hassell hoisted Borgstrom on his back.

“We're Marines. That's what we do.”

For 60 yards, he ran for his life, thinking, “Don't fall,” as shots kicked up dust around him. After he deposited Borgstrom – alive – Hassell raced back into the building to finish the job.

His heroics were captured by a Newsweek photographer, and his picture beamed around the world.

As a Marine, he'd trained for the tests of war. And passed spectacularly.

But returning to civilian life – and all that he fought for – that would prove to be harder than he imagined.

‘Couch surfers'

It starts with euphoria.

But returning from war often descends into something darker: Nightmares. Anxiety. Drinking.

Drinking leads to detachment. And detachment leads to self-destructive behavior.

“We spend a year in a place like hell,” says wounded Iraq War veteran Chris Lawrence, who counsels young veterans at Veterans Village of San Diego. “When you come home, you're excited the first few weeks. Then you start to miss hell.”

It's not the combat they miss. It's the camaraderie, the purpose, the brotherhood forged in battle.

Hassell returned to his family home in Birmingham, Ala., in 2008, grateful to be alive. Until anxiety kept him awake two to three days at a time.

“I just was pissed off – I don't even know at who or what,” he says. “I started drinking.”

Soon, he was driving 100 mph down the freeway, thinking, “I made it home! What's going to hurt me here?”

Hassell's story is common among post-9/11 vets.

“I remember driving around with a loaded .45 in my truck,” says wounded Iraq War veteran Carlos Figueroa, 32, of Long Beach. “I was super hyper-vigilant. I'd always been the clown, but I changed to, ‘If you stare at me for 30 seconds, I consider you a threat.'”

If all this weren't enough, today's veterans feel unwanted in the workplace. “It was like coming back from the dead because everyone in your life has moved on without you,” says Iraq War veteran Mickiela Montoya, 26, of Irvine. “While you're away, their lives continued. They had jobs. Our skills are virtually useless.”

This has created a new class of homeless among many post-9/11 vets. They're called “couch surfers,” bouncing house to house among relatives and friends, often landing in their car.

“I'm embarrassed,” admits homeless Iraq War veteran James Hegler, 25, of San Diego. “I had my own house. I had money in my pocket to feed my family. Now I don't got anything!”

Hassell never had to couch-surf, but he did retreat to his parents' home in Alabama for a few months before following his wife and daughter to Tustin earlier this year.

He's now at a new, pivotal stage – one that every combat veteran eventually must face. Three years after leaving Iraq, Hassell is ready to come home. All the way home.

The best thing

He is a normal civilian, except when he's not. He is a husband and dad with mounting bills.

His anger, he says, came from trying to be who he was before he went to war, before he had to shoot people and watch friends die. Talking to a counselor helped.

“I finally realized that you're not the same person you were before you joined; you'll never be,” he says. “All you can do is move forward from where you are now.”

And that is what he is doing – with the words of 1st Sgt. LeHew echoing in his head: Don't let this be the greatest thing you've ever done.

“The best thing I can do is be a good husband to my wife and be a great dad to my daughter and be an even better human being,” he says. “If I live my life with honor – with the same zest that I served with – then I'll be OK.”

All he needs is two months' rent.

Deanne Tate, at Veterans First, listens politely, crying, knowing there's nothing in her budget to help. And knowing what she must do. “Of course,” she says.

Without saying it's from her personal account, she writes a check for $1,425 – half of what Hassell needs, but all she can afford.

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